National League outfielder Yasiel Puig (66) of the Los Angeles Dodgers striking out completely in the 2014 Home Run Derby. / Scott Rovak, USA TODAY Sports

by David Leon Moore, USA TODAY Sports

by David Leon Moore, USA TODAY Sports

LOS ANGELES -- The Dodger Bunch, a group of Los Angeles Dodgers fans in and around Pasadena that share four season tickets, loved the All-Star Game.

Not that the National League lost.

Not that Dodgers outfielder Yasiel Puig kept striking out.

No, they loved it because they could actually watch the Dodgers play baseball on television.

For an estimated 70% of the huge L.A. TV market, the Dodgers have been a virtual ghost squad this season, because of an impasse between Time Warner Cable, which bought the rights to show them for 25 years for $8.35 billion, and other satellite and cable providers who have refused to pay what they say is Time Warner's exorbitant asking price for the club's SportsNet LA channel.

And as the Dodgers return to action Friday at the St. Louis Cardinals, there is nothing on the horizon that suggests the mega-media companies are willing to work something out. If anything, the rhetoric is rising.

So in Pasadena, a large, diverse city with pockets of affluence and thousands of loyal Dodgers fans just 10 miles north of Dodger Stadium, the games are unavailable on TV. Pasadena has Charter Cable, which, like the other area cable and satellite providers, has not been able to make a deal with Time Warner.

"The problem is greed," says Geoffrey Baum, a University of Southern California administrator who lives in Pasadena, loves the Dodgers and attends about 10 games a year. "I don't understand how they could make this deal and leave out the fans like this.

"It's been terrible. It's extremely frustrating not to see."

To keep up with his favorite players ‚?? Clayton Kershaw and Matt Kemp ‚?? and the other Dodgers, Baum has ESPN GameCast on his phone. He listens to games in his car. He went to a bar in neighboring Sierra Madre to watch a game. He even (gasp!) reads the newspaper.

But his patience is being tested.

"I wouldn't say at this point it's caused me to lose any loyalty to the Dodgers," Baum says. "But if it continues beyond this year, it would be increasingly difficult to maintain enthusiasm."

Could it last all year? It seems inconceivable that a first-place team, with a pitcher (Kershaw) being compared to Sandy Koufax, an exciting surprise all-star (second baseman Dee Gordon), the ever-unpredictable Cuban entertainer (Puig), not to mention the greatest baseball voice in history (Vin Scully, 86 years young), would be unavailable to 70% of its fans on TV.

But there are no signs of Time Warner blinking or the other providers, the biggest being DirecTV.

DirecTV spokesman Thomas Tyrer provided a statement to USA TODAY Sports on Wednesday with the latest company stance:

"DIRECTV hopes to enable any Dodger fan who wants Time Warner Cable SportsNet LA to have it so those who've remained most loyal to the team can see what remains of this pennant chase. Time Warner Cable paid an all-time high of eight-and-a-half billion dollars to create a one-team, one-sport channel with games only half the year, and yet still demands everyone else bear the entire financial responsibility for their excess. Nothing has changed since the start of this season except for Time Warner's willingness to spend millions more of its customers' money on advertising to upset the same fans whose loyalties it's unnecessarily tested during the entire first half."

Time Warner blasted DirecTV for not being willing to negotiate.

"I'm so frustrated for the Dodger fans, and I'm also so frustrated because of DirecTV's unwillingness to even engage us," Time Warner Cable Sports President David Rone told USA TODAY Sports on Wednesday. "They have no sense of urgency to get it solved. We have not been at the negotiating table with them for four or six weeks, and there is nothing scheduled."

Rone said other local cable companies, such as Charter and Cox, seem to be following the lead of DirecTV.

How is this going to turn out?

"Historically, they find a way to work these deals out," David Carter, principal of the Sports Business Group, a sports industry consulting firm, and executive director of USC's Sports Business Institute, told USA TODAY Sports. "But in some cases, like with the Pac-12 Network, there continue to be carriage problems and the impasse can be rather prolonged.

"If this season goes by with no resolution, I think there would be tremendous financial pressure, especially at Time Warner Cable, to get a deal done in the offseason."

Some fans have blamed the Dodgers for the mess. They should have known, the argument goes, that such a huge commitment from Time Warner might not make business sense, and that other providers would not be willing to bail out Time Warner.

Scully, the team's legendary broadcaster, told USA TODAY Sports he feels "bad for all the baseball fans out there who cannot see the Dodgers. I hope the situation is resolved soon."

Scully no longer makes East Coast road trips with the Dodgers. When he stays home, he too is in the dark.

"I have DirecTV," he said.

Dodgers executives have tried to stay out of the fray.

"We're doing everything we can to get this thing resolved," said Lon Rosen, the Dodgers' executive vice president and chief marketing officer. "We really feel for our fans."

They might feel for themselves as well. The Dodgers' regional TV ratings and viewership figures are down 70% from last year. They're averaging about 40,000 homes.

By contrast, the Los Angeles Angels, who have long labored in a media shadow cast by the Dodgers, are averaging about 80,000 homes on their telecasts.

"I think the Dodgers have to be somewhat concerned about being out of sight, out of mind," Carter said. "In a market like Southern California, with so much going on, even a brand and a team as successful as the Dodgers needs to consistently be in front of everybody or they run the risk of not falling off the radar but of not being primarily on the radar.

"Beyond the inner circle of die-hard Dodger fans, you wonder about what's going on with that next layer of fans. There's not a whole lot else going on right now. This would a great time for the Dodgers to be broadcasting, before the NFL gets going."

Meanwhile, the Dodgers fans keep complaining.

"We, the fans, get lost in the middle," said Dodgers fan Vince Pippin, from Eastvale, Calif., named for Scully. "No one cares about us. Our opinion doesn't matter. But, I mean, this is the Dodgers. It's not like we're talking about the Royals."

Can anyone imagine Scully's last season (it could be, he goes year to year) being blacked out?

Can anyone imagine a Kershaw no-hitter being blacked out?

Oh, wait, that already happened ‚?? on June 18, when Kershaw allowed no hits, no walks and struck out 15 in an 8-0 victory in Dodger Stadium against the Colorado Rockies.

When word of the gem spread in the latter innings, the Dodger Bunch scrambled to keep up.

Dennis Murphy, a Pasadena accountant, tuned in to the MLB Network, which did cut-ins to the game.

Tim Wendler, another Pasadena Dodgers fan, went to the computer.

"Kershaw is my favorite Dodger, and I think this was one of the greatest games ever pitched, and we were reduced to watching play-by-play online, with no visuals," Wendler said.

Some of the Dodger Bunch fans have called their local cable companies to complain. They found that making progress on the issue with a faceless voice on the phone was about as easy as hitting a Kershaw curveball, or as fruitless as turning on their TVs and looking for the Dodgers.